Thursday, March 01, 2007

Bombs in Boston, babes in banks, etc.

--Boston faced yet another bomb scare, detonating what turned out to be a traffic counter. No kidding! You know, guys, I’ve heard a rumor about a Green Monster prowling Fenway Park. Why don’t you brainiacs check out that lead?

--Wouldn’t you let them rob you too?--Authorities say these girls may be as young as 16. Which means that they're really just practicing.

--Lt. Drebin was quoted as saying, "That's very impressive, yes."

--They weren't caught kissing, so theoretically they could still become Miss USA.

--Do you suppose Paris Hilton was their getaway driver? Cheap shot…

--Supposedly Paris didn’t even know that she had a suspended license after she was pulled over for speeding with her headlights off. Of course she didn’t know she had a suspended license--she was too drunk and/or drugged out to remember. “Honest, occifer!”

--My Dad informed me the other day that the jar of Peter Pan that he and I devoured before I moved up was one of the 2111-coded salmonella jars. Yummy. Funny thing is, after my little incident with Peter Pan during Katrina, I had stopped eating that brand of peanut butter for a year. Then I started again. And nothing happened to me. But I’m still grossed out.

--It’s a bad time to be a labor union, isn’t it? Every time you turn around, George W. Bush is signing legislation that eviscerates unions. Makes me wonder how much he really cares about the biggest union of all, the United States.

--I gave blood yesterday for the first time in years. You know something? It went a lot faster this time. They told me it was because the technology has improved. Apparently they can make blood bleed into a bag faster. Behold the future!

--The blood people saw my name and asked me if I was a full-blooded Irishman. I said, “I was, but now I’m a pint short.” No, I didn’t actually say that. But if I had, I’m sure it would have been the first time they’d ever had that conversation.

--One of the local radio stations here is devoting its morning show to a poll of the best album ever. They are receiving scads of calls and e-mails from listeners eager to influence the results. But here’s what I don’t understand: the hosts continuously offer suggestions for best album. Doesn’t that negate the honesty of the poll? Because most of these subtle suggestions are immediately followed by calls of, “Oh yeah, I love Dark Side of the Moon!” That’s push-polling if you ask me. Also, they’re wrong about a lot of it; one deejay just said that Marvin Gaye was murdered shortly after recording “What’s Going On.” The other one said, “Uh, I think that came out in the ’70s.” Yesterday, they had a caller say, “My favorite album is from 1987. Prince’s Purple Rain!” Gad. I was half-asleep at the time, and still I said, “That was 1984...hrrrn….” Such a parallel of our political polling…and awareness, apparently…

--Donald Trump (!!) was just on the radio talking about a school that is enforcing a total-silence policy during lunch periods. He hates that. I do too, and I speak from experience: in fifth grade, my school decided that my huge school of 300 students was too loud in the cafeteria, so we were not allowed to talk. One of my teachers told us--with a straight face--that “you’re always daydreaming in class anyway, so why not get that out during lunch?” That same year, she decided that (because of an incident involving an insulin-challenged classmate) we had to clear all food trades with her. I remember having to walk all the way across the cafeteria every time I wanted a friend’s Dorito…and how annoyed she would be when I’d pull her away from her conversation. To quote the late great Calvin, “People who are nostalgic about childhood were obviously never children.”

--Hallmark has started new card lines that they say are in line with today’s needs. One of them expresses regret that you lost your job. How about one for, “I’m sorry we live in such depressing times because our president is a union-hating, self-obsessed, oil-hungry killmonger?” I’d buy it.

--More than a decade after my original one was stolen, I bought a secondhand copy of “Rad Racer” for my Nintendo. And you know what? It really is.

4 comments:

Nathan, I apologize profusely for not deleting that comment the nanosecond I realized it was on there. It's been around these parts before. Whoever said that "brevity is the soul of wit" obviously met that person.

I remember once Alex wanted to give me a Dorito, and I said no, because I didn't want to get in trouble. And he said, "What she doesn't know what hurt her." But even though we were all the way across the table from her, I still asked her anyway. I'm so different now!